The collaboration with Wexford Festival Opera for the year 2023 is about to start again.
The Italian Institute of Culture is pleased to present the first in a series of three new prestigious concerts to take place between March and June 2023 featuring artists from the famous Irish Opera Festival.
The first concert will be held at St. Ann’s Church and will see the participation of Ami Hewitt (soprano), Michael Bell (tenor) and Andrew Synott (pianist) with a rich program of opera arias in Italian.
Not to be missed!
PROGRAMME
- Tornami a vagheggiar – Alcina (Handel)
- Nel Grave Tormento – Mitridate Re di Ponto (Mozart)
- La ricordanza (Bellini)
- Di rigori armato – Der Rosenkavalier (Strauss)
- Chacun le sait – La Fille du Régiment (Donizetti)
- Chiedi all’aura lusinghiera – L’elisir D’amore (Donizetti)
- Una furtiva lagrima – L’elisir D’amore (Donizetti)
- Dal labbro il canto – Falstaff (Verdi)
- Gualtier Maldè!…Caro nome – Rigoletto (Verdi)
- E il sol dell’anima – Rigoletto (Verdi)
Free admission by reservation.
Wednesday 8 March 2023 at 18.30
St. Ann’s Church – 18 Dawson Street – Dublin
BIO
Ami Hewitt – soprano
Ami Hewitt is a Soprano from Dublin. She is part of Wexford Festival Opera’s Wexford Factory taking the role of the Stepmother in last year’s Wexford Festival Opera staging of Cinderella. She is a graduate of Trinity College Dublin and TUD conservatory of Music and Drama, where she attained her BmusEd degree majoring in vocal performance. She more recently graduated with distinction from a master’s degree in Voice and Opera at Conservatorium Maastricht in The Netherlands. Ami was a finalist in the Omroep Max (Dutch) inaugural televised program ‘Aria’, which is in association with Dutch National Opera and the National Youth Orchestra conducted by Leonard Evers.
As an ABL aviation studio artist with INO during the 21/22 season, Ami has enjoyed understudying the roles of Marzelline in Fidelio (Beethoven), Idaspe in Bajazet (Vivaldi), and Frasquita in Carmen (Bizet). Alongside the other studio members, Ami performed a program of arias and ensembles in University Concert Hall, Limerick, and Castletown House, accompanied by Richard McGrath. The studio year culminated with a gala performance in the Gaiety Theatre with the INO orchestra.
Michael Bell – Tenor
Northern Irish tenor, Michael is part of Wexford Festival Opera’s Wexford Factory and took the role of the Prince in last year’s performance of Cinderella in this years’ Wexford Festival Opera. Equally at home on the recital platform and the opera stage, Michael is fast establishing himself as a new voice worth watching.
Michael is currently studying at the Royal College of Music in London with Russell Smythe having previously held a choral scholarship at St John’s College, Cambridge. Michael gave the Moscow premiere performance of the Madwoman in Britten’s Curlew River, created the role of the Pilot in Nicholas Jackson’s Le Petit Prince and sang Nemorino in Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore for Duchy Opera. In the 2021-22 season, roles have included Grimoaldo in Handel’s Rodelinda, Tamino in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte and the Witch in Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel for the Royal College of Music’s International Opera School. Additionally, he sang Almaviva in a school’s production of Rossini’s The Barber of Seville for Jackdaws Music Trust. Later in the season he looks forward to singing Pastore in Monteverdi’s Orfeo for Garsington Opera, and the Prince in Alma Deutscher’s Cinderella for Wexford Festival Opera. Michael has enjoyed relationships with the Lewes Festival of Song, Drogheda Classical Music and the London Song Festival, among others.
Andrew Synott- Pianist
Andrew is the artist in residence and chorus master at Wexford Festival Opera. He has conducted opera productions for Irish National Opera, Wexford Festival Opera, Opera Theatre Company, Co-Opera, Glasthule Opera, and the Royal Irish Academy of Music. He has also conducted the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, the RTE Concert Orchestra and Chamber Choir Ireland. In January 2015, Andrew composed and conducted the premiere of his first opera, Breakdown, in the National Concert Hall, Dublin.
His second opera, Dubliners, was premiered at Wexford Festival Opera in 2017 and was nominated for an Irish Times Theatre Award in the Best Opera category. In 2019, with the premiere of La cucina, he became the first living Irish composer to have an opera performed on the main stage at Wexford Festival Opera. In 2020 Wexford commissioned the chamber opera, What Happened To Lucrece, for filming and broadcast during Wexford’s 2020 Festival in the Air.
Reservation no longer available
